Toshihiko Izutsu was Professor Emeritus at Keio University in Japan and an outstanding authority in the metaphysical and philosophical wisdom schools of Islamic Sufism, Hindu Advaita Vedanta, Mahayana Buddhism (particularly Zen), and Philosophical Taoism. Fluent in over 30 languages, including Arabic, Persian, Sanskrit, Pali, Chinese, Japanese, Russian and Greek, his peripatetic research in such places as the Middle East (especially Iran), India, Europe, North America, and Asia were undertaken with a view to developing a meta-philosophical approach to comparative religion based upon a rigorous linguistic study of traditional metaphysical texts. Izutsu often stated his belief that harmony could be fostered between peoples by demonstrating that many beliefs with which a community identified itself could be found, though perhaps masked in a different form, in the metaphysics of another, very different community.

His most important works include Sufism and Taoism: A Comparative Study of Key Philosophical Concepts (1983) and a posthumously published collection of essays entitled Creation and the Timeless Order of Things (1994).